Of the Inhuman Persecution the King Initiated Against All Religious1

book 1, chapter 27 Of the Inhuman Persecution the King Initiated against All Religious1

The king’s deeds were so beyond all reason or justice that no sane, impartial person could think them anything but awful—and the saintlier and more exemplary their lives, the more they abhorred them. Henry knew this and it tormented him. For, sinful and frenzied though he was in his life and rule (as we have seen), he desired to be so but not to seem so, at least to good men and the servants of God. In those days, there were many religious orders in Eng- land, with numerous noteworthy servants of our Lord, renowned in sanctity and learning; but there were three of particular prominence: the Carthusians, the Observant Franciscans, and the Bridgettines. And so Henry resolved to assail and assault these orders, in hopes that when their members were con- quered and reduced to obedience, all the others would yield and submit. We see in this the providence of our Lord, who allowed him to exhaust his artillery in attacking the very strongest: unable to breach or overthrow the impregnable force of truth, he would be left all the more abashed and confused, while the holy religious would triumph with yet greater glory, giving in their struggle an illustrious testimony to our true and sacred faith. And so, on April 29, 1535, three venerable Carthusian priors were sum- moned, the decisions of parliament were put to them, and they were commanded to acknowledge and swear to the king’s supreme headship of the Church. They answered that the law of God commanded the opposite. And Cromwell (who, as we have said, was the king’s vicegerent in spirituals) said, with utter disdain, “You must swear, entirely, clearly, and distinctly, whether or not the law of God permits.” When they refused, saying that the Catholic Church taught no such thing, the damnable vicegerent retorted, “Don’t give me any nonsense about the Church! Will you swear, or not?” As they preferred to displease their king rather than their God, they were sentenced to death, without being defrocked, in the Carthusian habit—as a greater disrespect and insult to religion.2 A ccompanying them were John Hale, a priest and vicar,

1 Sander, De origine ac progressu, 125–30. 2 Sander takes this story from Maurice Chauncy’s (c.1509–81) Historia aliquot nostri saeculi martyrum (1550). Ribadeneyra draws on other parts of the text, and was probably familiar with its 1583 printing at Burgos. “After they had been imprisoned for a week, many members

Of the Persecution the King Initiated against All Religious 225 full of zeal, and Reynolds [Reginaldo], a noted theologian and Bridgettine monk, a man illustrious for his piety and learning.3 Standing at the foot of the gallows, he urged the crowd to unceasing prayer for the king, lest he who had been a Solomon in piety and wisdom at the beginning of his reign also end like him, deceived and corrupted by women.4 He died, as Cardinal Pole writes, with such happiness and steadfastness that when the noose was placed around his neck, it seemed a necklace of precious stones.5 These five died in the same place, outside the city of London, on May 4; to further intimidate the Carthusians, the quartered remains of one of them, the prior of London, were placed at the monastery gate, while two laymen were made superiors of the house, to pervert the young monks by flattery and threats. These laymen lived in luxury and overabundance, while they murdered several of the monks through starvation, and abused and harassed the rest with blows and insults. Seeing that they defended themselves with the authority of Holy Scripture and the Church Fathers, they stripped them of every book—but the Lord taught them what to do and what to say. Perceiving that nothing came of this, the heretics ordered another three Carthusian priests seized and bound

of the king’s council came to them, to put to them parliament’s decree abrogating the authority of the pope, and falsely, violently, and criminally usurping his supreme power, and abol- ishing all external powers, jurisdictions, and obediences, to whatever person or entity they may have been owed or promised. Only the king and his people were to be obeyed, and the king himself acknowledged, regarded, and affirmed as supreme head of the Church, in spiri- tual and in temporal matters. And when our fathers replied that they would confer together as to whether and how far divine law would permit this, he [sc. Cromwell] declared, ‘I will admit of no exceptions, whether divine law permits or no: you must swear entirely, fully, and sincerely in your heart, and affirm it with a public, spoken oath, and maintain it firmly.’ Our most blessed fathers answered that the Catholic Church had always held and taught other- wise. He retorted, ‘I care nothing for the Church: will you submit, or not?’” Maurice Chauncy, Historia aliquot nostri sæculi martyrum cùm pia, tum lectu iucunda, nunc denuo typis excusa (Burgos: Felipe de Junta, 1583), sigs. Iiiiv–Iiv. 3 In April 1535, three Carthusian priors—John Houghton (c.1486–1535), Robert Lawrence (c.1485–1535), and Augustine Webster (1488–1535)—along with Richard Reynolds (c.1492– 1535), a Bridgettine monk and a Cambridge-educated scholar of great renown, were arrested for treason. On May 4, they were hanged at Tyburn, together with John Hale (d.1535), the vicar of Isleworth (the parish responsible for Syon Abbey). Virginia R. Bainbridge notes the “unprecedented step” of hanging them still in their habits, without having been de- graded. Virginia R. Bainbridge, “Reynolds, Richard [St Richard Reynold] (d. 1535),” in odnb, 46:567–68. See Book 1 Figure 27.1. 4 1 Kings 11:3–4. 5 In the margin: “Book 3, Defense of the Unity of the Church [De unione Ecclesiæ.].” Pole, Defense, 253.